Read Online Accord of Honor by Kevin O. McLaughlin - Free Book Online

the bridge. “Weapons, we ready on all launchers?.”
    “Yes, sir!”
    “Radar, give me an update.”
    The young man at the radar con was sweating bullets now. I hid a smile. First times were always rough, and most of the crew, as skilled as they were, had never been in combat. Of course, neither had the enemy. Even my old experiences were nothing like how I expected a space battle to be fought today.
    “The rocks aren’t too big, sir. One or two tons each,” the radar tech said. Marks, that was his name. Too many new names at one time. “But they’re moving fast. They’ll intercept Mars atmosphere in thirty minutes, but should burn up harmlessly in the atmosphere. They’re headed very close to Mars Station. Possible intersect there in ten minutes. Hard to be precise without an active ping. I’m relying on secondhand data from communication satellites.”
    “That’s the game, then,” I said. “Blow the station with rocks. Or threaten it, anyway. Maybe they’re trying to see if the station has any countermeasures. Being cautious. Anyway, we can’t let them blow the station. Time to give them a little shock!”
    I hit the general intercom. “All hands, prepare for max acceleration in fifteen seconds.” Then to the radar station: “Marks, active ping. I want to know what those rocks ate for breakfast. Weapons, as soon as you have firing solutions, dump enough fission missiles into those things to turn them into dust.” I sat back in my chair and let my suit fill with the syrupy stuff I’d be breathing for the next while.
    Seconds later, we were headed back toward Mars Station at twenty-five gravities. We’d fired three full volleys of missiles, just to be sure, and they sped ahead of us toward their targets. My main concern now was where the actual ships were. We knew roughly where the asteroids had originated, and we were accelerating toward that point, but had no idea precisely where we’d find the enemy ships I knew had to be lying out there, waiting. Or how many of them were hiding there.
    Marks’s voice came over the suit radio. “Sir, I’m being called by Mars Station. They’re sounding pretty anxious over there.”
    “I’ll just bet they are,” I replied. My voice sounded odd. The perfluorocarbon goo didn’t transmit sound well, so we had subvocalization mikes for talking The computer assisted reconstruction of a real voice was good, but it still wasn’t quite right. “Pass the channel over to me.”
    There was a short buzz, and then I heard a tech from the station calling out in a voice that sounded about ready to crack, “Attention, unidentified ship. You are in violation of Mars space, and in violation of the Lunar Accord treaty. Cease fire and identify yourselves!”
    “This is the ship SSI Defender, Admiral Stein commanding. We are tracking three asteroids inbound on Mars Station, and have fired interceptors to destroy them before they can destroy you. We believe these asteroids to be part of an attack by an enemy force, and are moving to engage them.” No response. Well, I’d given him something to chew on. I figured he’d have his boss on the line in a minute or two.
    I eyeballed the plot, showing the computer’s best guess of the enemy ships’ location when they gave the asteroids a push, and a blossoming ball of red that represented the probable region they could be in by now. That ball was getting bigger by the minute, but it was all still contained between Mars and one of the moons, Deimos. Which gave me an idea. There was a small mining colony on Deimos, and SSI still had access rights to their comm arrays for emergencies. This certainly qualified.
    “Weapons, kick out sabot rounds, two full volleys, twenty second separation. Give each volley ten seconds burn then send them cold. Target vector is the center of the probability matrix.” He looked quizzical, but to his credit he didn’t ask any questions, just got right to it.
    “Another message from Mars Station, sir.